Abstract
Porphyrin nanostructures with well-controlled size, shape and functionality can be used for visible-light photocatalysis. In this work, a graphene@porphyrin nanofibre composite was successfully fabricated via arginine-mediated self-assembly of tetrakis (4-carboxyphenyl) porphyrin (TCPP) on graphene nanoplates (GNPs). The formation and crystallisation of the graphene@porphyrin nanofibre composite was fully characterized by scanning electron microscopy (SEM), transmission electron microscopy (TEM), X-ray diffraction (XRD), fourier transform infrared (FTIR), ultraviolet-visible (UV-vis) and fluorescence spectroscopy. The assembled TCPP nanofibers were 50–200 nm in diameter with length in micrometers long, which were densely and uniformly distributed on the surface of graphene. The GNPs@TCPP nanofibers showed enhanced visible-light photocatalytic activity in comparison with free-standing TCPP nanorods for the degradation of Rhodamine B (RhB) and methyl orange (MO). The possible photodegradation mechanism of these dyes by the GNPs@TCPP nanofiber photocatalyst was proposed.
Highlights
Chemicals such as dry acetone, propionic acid, dichloromethane, chloroform, sodium hydroxide (NaOH), methyl orange (MO), Rhodamine B (RhB), potassium hydroxide (KOH) and ethanol were purchased from Ajax Finechem (Melbourne, Australia)
It is clear that the graphene nanoplates (GNPs) have a wrinkled, crumpled structure with a lateral diameter of tens of microns
The semitransparency of GNPs to the electron beam suggests that the thickness of GNPs is approximately 5–15 nm [40]
Summary
Supramolecular self-assembly of porphyrin-based materials has attracted intensive interest from scientists as an effective protocol to design functional structures during the past decade [1,2,3].π-Conjugated porphyrins have been extensively studied as building blocks for the construction of solid-state nanostructured materials [4,5,6,7,8], which can be utilized in many applications such as optoelectronic nanodevices, energy storage, catalysis, photodynamic therapy, sensors and photonics [9,10,11,12,13]. Supramolecular nanostructures via self-assembly are usually produced via non-covalent interactions such as hydrogen bonding, electrostatic, van der Waals interactions, π–π interactions, and coordination. These soft materials are fabricated by self-assembly protocols including ionic self-assembly [14], surfactant-assisted self-assembly (SAS) [15], and reprecipitation [16,17]. Recently; visible-light photocatalytic applications of self-assembled porphyrin nanostructures have been extensively reported [23,24,25]. Zhong and colleagues reported the dependence of photocatalytic performance on various hierarchically structured porphyrin nanocrystals such as nanosheets, octahedrons and microspheres [26]. We successfully fabricated porphyrin nanobelts via arginine-induced self-assembly of tetrakis (4-carboxyphenyl) porphyrin (TCPP), and used the structure for the photodegradation of model pollutant Rhodamine B (RhB) under visible-light irradiation [27,28]
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